Armenta, Ernest
Ernest is in the Chemistry Graduate Program and joined the CMB training program in 2019. He received a B.S. in Neuroscience from UC Riverside.
Mentor: Dr. Keriann Backus
Currently, there are no chemical tools available that can control protein subcellular localization. Such tools would be beneficial in studying the effects protein localization has on protein function. Our central hypothesis is that chemical probes, which offer the advantage of acute application and precise temporal control, can be designed and applied to rewire protein subcellular localization. A wide variety of genetic disorders are known to be caused by protein mislocalization, so developing tools to relocalize proteins could have translational applications.
My research focuses on the synthesis and application of new custom chemical probes capable of altering protein subcellular localization. My work will reveal whether, and to what extent, localization can be chemically controlled and will develop highly enabling tools with wide ranging applications in molecular and cell biology. We will begin by testing our probes on model fusion proteins and, if successful, will apply our reagents to study how translation initiation factors are regulated by subcellular localization.
